I've been playing some draft mode dominion games, and it turns out that almost always the same champions get banned. I know that Rammus gets banned because of his tank abilities and high speed.

Now I know why Akali gets banned: in the few games I've seen her been played, she was much better than the other champions. The thing I was wondering is: Why? In normal games she is pretty balanced and easy to counter.

I just don't know what makes her so good in dominion. Is it because of the dominion items? Or was it just luck that I fought against or with really good Akalis?

2 Answers
2

Akali has huge advantages in her skill set that allow her to excel in Dominion.

Dominion involves a lot of 1v1 fights

Akali is one of the best 1v1 champions in the game. Her mark of the assassin just gives her enormous burst, even at early levels.

She has an amazing escape mechanism using Twilight shroud

This is perfect for juking in the middle of the map, and perfect for protecting her when she is defending a turret.

Her mobility using via Shadow Dance

You are never going to escape from her, especially if she has a slow. She can also use it to bink to escape by targeting minions. This, along with her Twilight shroud make her a very tricky champion to kill and a champion almost impossible to escape from.

Her damage is hybrid

Is is pretty hard to counter Akali because of her different damage types. Getting the balance of defense, mobility and offensive items is hard enough.

She has innate spell vamp through her passive Twin Disciplines

Her spell vamp combined with the high burst makes her very hard to kill quickly. This also gives her a lot of sustainability through leeching health from minions. Without the ability to nuke her down easily, she can try to escape using her shroud/ult/summoner spells.

More champions play 'glass cannon' builds than on Summoners Rift

Glass cannon champions tend to be easy prey for Akali. A lot of builds are base around kiting and mobility. Kiting just doesn't work on her because of her ultimate and she has HUGE burst which will bring down any squishy champions pretty rapidly.

The Dominion is map is designed to be played offensively

Akali can gank pretty freely as there aren't really any 'safe zones' you can run to, i.e. behind your tower line on normal matches. This leads up to her snowballing pretty quickly as she is just fantastic at picking off roaming enemies.

She snowballs rapidly

Her burst gets insane if she is fed, combine this with the inability to escape from her and your team are in for some big trouble.

Akali is based on energy

She is not the only manaless champ, however manaless champs have always had the advantage of being able to spam skills at no cost. This means Akali can constantly push lanes and leech health through her passive, without having to worry too much about going back to base to heal up.

Akali is an assassin, so if she gets some kills early game and gets fed enough, you can prey for the rest of the game as she will own you all (Except if you stand 5v5, but that's not how Dominion is being played for the moment, team is always separated into at least 2 groups).

I believe problem is that clear strategies and team play aren't yet know by most dominion players (to be understood : We play like crap). She very rarely gets killed because she has a great escape (becoming invisible in her Twilight Shroud) and people don't try to finish her but go for the capture point instead.

Her Twilight Shroud and her dash (ult) are her strongest weapons in dominion. In standard game, when she triggers her invisibility, you just get out of range (unless you are very sure to win, but in this case, she's just trying to escape). Everyone knows fighting Akali in her Twilight Shroud is stupid as she will deal insane damage before returning to stealth without you dealing half as much to her. Except in Dominion, people really want to get that capture point and stay. Other thing is that the to get to your turret is very long (as you fight not between two turrets but at a turret), she has plenty of time to kill you (with her dash) and people also very rarely back.

Conclusion : You stand no chance vs Akali in 1v1 because : either she kills you, either she escapes or waits for teammates in her Twilight Shroud (preventing you from taking capture point). Once she gets enough items (a little more stuff than others), she just goes around dashing to every low life hero. As it is much harder to escape in dominion than in standard game, she basically always makes a kill.

This Meaning you have to have some good team-play to get her, but lets be honest, I've not seen yet some very good team-play in Dominion (too early, people haven't yet defined strategies), except maybe for premade teams.